


Give Me Sanctuary

by ruric



Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: Community: slashthedrabble, Flashbacks, M/M, Reflections about death, overtones of PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-01-28
Updated: 2005-01-28
Packaged: 2017-11-07 20:30:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/435132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruric/pseuds/ruric
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vampires don't feel human, not when you wake next to a cold body in the middle of the night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Give Me Sanctuary

Lindsey knows what touching a vampire is like. He's had enough meetings with Russell Winters and his kind. Old vampires don't need to pass as human, not like the younger ones. Winters had rarely bothered – unless he was stalking one of his new conquests. Shaking hands with him had been like touching a corpse – cool, dead flesh. It left Lindsey wanting to surreptitiously wipe his hand on his pants to remove the taint.

Even so, a business meeting with a vampire is different to having one in your bed. 

Lindsey wakes to find Angel cold and still beside him - a humped silhouette in the shadowy room, not breathing, not alive, dead. Half asleep he's wide open to the memories, a fire-flashed slide-show behind his eyes, and he's out of bed, half-conscious, stumbling towards the bathroom. 

That's how Angel finds him. 

Crouched over the toilet, retching emptily – kneeling, trying to get a grip on the nausea, knuckles showing whitely through a hand clamped tightly over the rim. Trying to control the shakes that cramp his calves and dance up his spine to explode in his head, too sick, too shaken, to be ashamed.

Angel hands him a damp towel, and he swipes it gratefully across his mouth and nose, coughs and spits wanting to be rid of the sour taste. Watching through a watery haze, he sees Angel's mouth twist in bitterness and pain as he turns to leave. Easy to understand the connections the vampire's making, even if they're wrong, and far easier to let Angel walk away thinking that.

He comes to his feet too fast, bile climbing up his throat, an acid burn he fights back down. The world tilts and he reaches out, fingers curling around Angel's arm, more to stop himself going back down than for any other reason.

"Angel...not you," he has to swallow against sickness, but the calm, steady gaze turns on him – and Angel nods once.

"Too many bad memories?"

He can't take what he sees in Angel's eyes and shuts his own against understanding and the wildly spinning room.

He feels Angel step nearer and arms close around him, pulling him into a body now warmed all the way up to human temperature, maybe a little beyond. Nothing to do but stand here, his own arms wrapped around Angel's chest, whilst the shakes play out, whilst the slideshow in his head hits replay, and keep his jaw locked trying to stop his teeth chattering like a man freezing to death.

Forehead resting against Angel's chest he slowly becomes aware of the hand stroking down his back, long slow rhythmic strokes, from neck to hip. Becomes aware of the warm body, gradually thawing his own coldness, feels Angel's chest rise and fall, hears the low buzz which seems to replace heartbeats in vampires. 

He can't remember the last time he's been held; not like this, not so close, not without expectation of anything in return and that very nearly breaks him.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the "touch" prompt on the LJ community [slashthedrabble](http://slashthedrabble.livejournal.com/).


End file.
